A Decade Later
Dr. Dovalina enjoys 10-year journey as LCC President; eyes future with excitement
Dr.
Ramon Dovalina can vividly recall the eagerness, excitement and joy he
experienced when he became president of Laredo Community College on July 5,
1995.
It’s no wonder, considering Dovalina still has the feelings and energy he felt a decade ago when he accepted the responsibilities and challenges of leading Laredo’s hometown college.
Born and raised in Laredo, the former Laredo Junior College student remembers the thrill of returning to LCC to serve the 57-year-old institution as its fifth president. He had been a student at the college in 1960-1961 and again in 1965-66 after three years of service in the United States Marine Corps.
In the next 30 years after attending the college, Dovalina obtained bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Texas A&I University in Kingsville, and a doctorate from The University of Texas at Austin. He then taught in the public schools before going into college administration, working at Del Mar College and then moving to Austin to help open Austin Community College. He served that community college for 22 years in various positions.
COMING HOME
Dovalina said it was rewarding to come back to the college where he got his first years of a higher education.
“Ten years later, I still feel just as rewarded to get the opportunity to serve the community that served me,” Dovalina said. “I got a good foundation for my education. Those first two years were in many ways more challenging than my later studies, but it helped me succeed and complete my educational goals.”
During his first year as LCC president, Dovalina began a re-emphasis on the historical setting of old Fort McIntosh as a background for a modern community college for the new millennium. A 10-year master plan and more than $14 million in revenue bonds were approved to improve the infrastructure and bring new technology.
“New technology, distance education, instructional television and new computer labs, particularly The Corral, have helped improve the quality of instruction at LCC,” Dovalina said.
However, the new Guadalupe and Lilia Martinez Fine Arts Center, which opened in 2003, has been one of the most critical advancements achieved at the LCC campus near downtown.
“The fine arts center took a lot of art programs from older facilities on campus that were not meant for instruction. Today, students are learning in a quality facility and it also serves as an outstanding place to host culturally enriching performances,” Dovalina noted.
The local environment also is benefiting, thanks to the creation of the Lamar Bruni Vergara Environmental Science Center on campus.
“The environmental science center has brought forth issues concerning the quality of the environment and our surroundings,” Dovalina said. “It not only represents a space for learning, but a dynamic working relationship with the Rio Grande International Study Center.
“Many of our faculty members, beginning with Dr. Jim Earhart, have created an awareness in our community about issues such as the Manadas Creek habitat, erosion, air quality and other concerns affecting the Rio Grande ecosystem, which were not a concern in our community 10 years ago.”
IMPROVING OPPORTUNITIES
But, LCC’s expansion into a two-campus college district in 2004 has been the greatest achievement accomplished in the long and rich history of the community college.
“Laredo Community College South has opened a new world for the people of South Laredo. Many citizens who found it difficult to attend the main campus because of transportation issues no longer have that barrier,” Dovalina said.
“Providing access to higher education is improving the quality of life in South Laredo, and the community as a whole,” he added.
Dovalina expresses pride for the community’s overwhelming support to approve a $50 million bond issue to finance the land acquisition and construction for the South campus.
“The passage of the bond was encouraging after 83 percent of the voters agreed to fund it in support of higher education for the benefit of the community,” Dovalina said. “The college has kept its promise to maintain a tax rate of no more than 6.5 cents, and with the work of LCC’s business management staff and our board of trustees, the tax rate has been reduced now to 4.5 cents per $100.”
Problems that affected the community college 10 years ago also have been resolved, including the high failure rates of the nursing and police academy programs.
“We took corrective action in both programs, which now are fully accredited and are producing graduates that in some cases the entire class achieves a 100 percent passing rate in state and national certification exams,” Dovalina said.
“Laredo Community College is helping Laredo work in more ways than one because we help train people for the workforce,” Dovalina said. “We’re producing many of the law enforcement officers through our criminal justice and police academy programs, nurses and healthcare professionals through the health sciences division, and new school teachers for our community through the college’s arts and sciences programs and the teacher certification program.”
THE BURDEN OF GROWTH
Growing pains, funding and other issues are a top priority for Dovalina’s administration.
“Providing instruction to a service area much larger than our taxpaying district is one issue that the college continues to experience,” Dovalina said. “Communities such as Rio Bravo, El Cenizo, and many of the surrounding colonias, as well as Zapata and Jim Hogg counties, are in the college’s service delivery area. These communities benefit from our instruction, but do not pay taxes.
“The laws of the state of Texas to annex those areas make it almost impossible. There has to be willingness on the part of the leadership in those communities to be a part of the college and pay their fair share. When that happens we are able to reduce the tuition for the students.”
State financing is another issue, Dovalina said.
“Over the last six years, state funding has not kept up with increases in community colleges. We are receiving fewer dollars per hour of enrollment now than we were in the year 2000,” Dovalina said.
Consequently, the tax burden is shifting from the state to the local taxpayers through property taxes and is forcing the college to increase the cost of its tuition and fees.
He noted that although tuition has increased, LCC still offers the best value in town to attend college.
“We are still a bargain,” Dovalina said. “University tuition has increased even more and LCC’s tuition rates are now at about 35 percent of the universities.”
“Moreover, LCC has increased its scholarship endowment balance thanks to the generosity of our community. In 1995 we had less than $100,000; today we have more than a million dollars available to help needy and deserving students.”
Other than the cost of paying off the college’s bond indebtedness, which received overwhelming voter approval, Dovalina noted that the college district’s tax rate has remained consistently low.
“LCC has tried as best as we can to share the cost of education between the state, which provides reduced funding; the student, who gets the direct benefit; and the community, which indirectly benefits from having a skilled and educated workforce,” Dovalina said. “But we realize that one of the reasons our tax rate has been able to stay low is because of the assessed value of property in this community, which continues to rise. We also have been able to add to the tax base by annexing property that has been annexed by the city.
“We understand that taxes can be at or slightly above the previous year, from year to year, as long as property value continues to grow,” Dovalina said. “Therefore, we are able to generate more revenues with the same tax rate; however, we also recognize that there is a limit to what many people can pay in taxes for their homes. They have other responsibilities to meet, as well. LCC tries to be good stewards of the taxpayer’s money by not raising taxes any more than absolutely needed.”
BRIDGING THE EDUCATION GAP
A long-range concern at the college is the learning deficiency that many students must overcome when they first enroll in college.
“For many reasons, these students are not prepared for the rigors of a college or university. At the community college, we have to provide developmental study programs to bring those students up to par. The number of students who take developmental studies has dropped, but so has the number of graduates from the local public schools, even though student enrollment numbers continue to increase,” said Dovalina.
He suspects that part of the problem is that many students are dropping out before they complete high school and never make it to college.
“This is an issue we are working on with the public and private school districts, and the university through an educational consortium that was formed when I first returned to Laredo,” Dovalina said. “We are working on aligning our curriculum to help the school districts become more aware of what high school students need to know when they get to college. By aligning curricula, we believe that we are creating an easier transition from high school to college and we will be able to improve the quality of education in the public schools and the quality of the students who attend LCC and TAMIU.”
THE FACULTY FACTOR
Instructors are the backbone of any educational institution. At LCC, a commitment to attracting and retaining gifted faculty is a major concern.
LCC has been able to raise faculty salaries, but more must be done.
“LCC’s average faculty salary 10 years ago was ranked 26th in the state. Today, we are sixth; however, faculty with similar degrees and years of experience are paid more in the public schools than at the community college. Granted, LCC offers more benefits in many ways. But, when people are counting on salaries, it makes it difficult to attract teachers,” Dovalina said.
Continued growth also may affect faculty.
“If we have continuing growth, but are not able to fund new positions or we are unable to locate qualified full-time instructors to teach our new students, then we become dependent on more overloads on our faculty and our adjunct faculty members,” Dovalina said.
Many community colleges, particularly in larger communities, tend to rely more on adjunct (part-time) faculty because it costs less.
"With adjunct faculty, you don’t have to pay for their benefits. The pay rate is lower compared to the full-time rate. In Laredo, however, we don’t have access to a huge pool of part-time instructors. So LCC depends more on full-time faculty with overloads and have to employ a higher number of full-time faculty.”
He added that LCC offers several areas for faculty development. Whenever funds permit, faculty are sent to professional development conferences outside the community. The college also operates an employee’s technology advancement center, which offers help to faculty and other employees on how to use technology in the classroom. LCC also works with the state’s Starlink system to provide professional development through distance education.
“LCC has been blessed with faculty members, some of whom have been here since I was a student and they continue to serve new generations of students,” Dovalina said. “We also have a new cadre of faculty that have come in the last 10 years and are as loyal and dedicated to the students today as the faculty members who taught me in the military barracks of yesteryear.”
Dovalina also lauded the leadership efforts of the college district’s Board of Trustees.
“The college is fortunate to have board members that have been with this institution for many years, offering continuity and stability for LCC,” Dovalina said. “But they have also been risk-takers who have been willing to make the changes necessary so that the college can grow and improve.”
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE
What does the future hold for LCC? Dovalina predicts more growth and prosperity.
“Besides the possibility of the expansion of the district, LCC needs to continue to look at ways we can help Laredo work,” Dovalina said. “We are looking at new programs in building trades, health-related occupations, and continued expansion of our criminal justice and police academy programs.
“Of course every job is dependent on new technology and we continue to address that issue.”
He added that the second campus in South Laredo was built with the expectation that the main campus would be full by 2006.
“In fact, LCC could not have gotten the enrollments we got last year without the presence of the south campus. Our south campus numbers are respectable—near 2,000 in the fall and spring—but there is potential for growth there, up to 5,000.”
“I now suspect that that the south campus will be full within 7 to 8 years, and we’ll quickly have to look at the space set aside for one more classroom building at that campus,” Dovalina said. “And then perhaps if the community demands more post-secondary education, we will continue to make it accessible by looking at a campus in the north part of town.
“Only the future will tell.”
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